


Cuts Like A Shank

by dustandroses



Category: Oz (TV)
Genre: Author's Favorite, Canon Character of Color, Canon Typical Violence, Character of Color, Episode Related, Episode: s4e12 Cuts Like a Knife, Gen, Graphics, Humor, Original Characters - Freeform, Oz Kill-A-Thon, POV: Harold Perrineau, Picture Story, RPF, Shanks - Freeform, Violence, illustrated story
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-03-21
Updated: 2011-03-21
Packaged: 2017-10-17 04:21:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,251
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/172846
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dustandroses/pseuds/dustandroses
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Harold felt like posting a sign on the Green Room door today - <b>Warning:</b> The filming of this episode could be hazardous to your health.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cuts Like A Shank

**Author's Note:**

> _Italics_ are used for direct quotes from the series. The lines are from the episode "Cuts like a Knife" from Season Four, Episode Twelve, written by Tom Fontana and directed by Steve Buscemi.
> 
> Written for the [Oz Kill-A-Thon](http://community.livejournal.com/oz_wishing_well/32095.html).
> 
> Betas by Ozsaur and Trillingstar, my heroes and shit.
> 
> All Screencaps and Graphics are by Dustandroses.

  


 

  


  


  


  
_In Oz, you have to be ready to defend yourself at any given moment. Chances are the person coming at you has a weapon, so you've got to have one, too. You've got to be ready to kill your enemies, or at least slow them down._

“Cut! That’s good, Harold. I think that one’s a keeper. Let’s move on to the next shot.”

Buscemi turned to consult with Fontana as the props guy brought up everything for the next monologue. He set up a small table and arranged the props fussily, head bent low as he concentrated on his task.

Harold rolled Hill’s wheelchair around inside the Plexiglas box, careful to keep the wheels back from the edge of the platform. He’d found that taking a moment to move around between takes made a big difference in his performance.

When the props guy was finished, he nodded vaguely in Harold’s direction and left.

“Thanks, Alex,” Harold called after him. He wheeled himself up to the table full of props just as a PA handed him his water bottle.

“Oh, yeah.” He took a long drink before handing it back to her. “That’s just what I needed. You’re the best, Jen.”

He shuffled his props around, moving the stage blood to make it easier to get to when he faked cutting himself, and the shank needed to be on the right, not the left. Most of his mind was on his upcoming monologue, but he kept a wary eye out for the props guy. Harold could never get his name right - Alan or Arthur or Adrian - something that started with an A, but he had to be careful, because the guy got itchy when the actors moved their props around too much.

He’d tried talking to…was it Autry? But the guy mumbled his answers in monosyllables, and ran away at the first chance. It wasn’t worth making a big deal out of, though, so Harold just waited until the guy was gone before he got his props in order. He was ready to go by the time the crew did their final lighting check.

  


  


  


Buscemi shook his head in frustration. “You had this down in rehearsal, Harold. I’m not sure why you’re not getting it here."

Fontana nodded, gesturing emphatically. "It needs to look like you really cut yourself, not just dipped your thumb in some fake blood for the camera. We want to see you in some pain, all right?"

Buscemi rolled his eyes as Fontana stalked away. He slapped Harold on the arm. "We’re still rolling, whenever you’re ready.”

“Right. Pain. I can do that.” Harold took a deep breath and started again.

 _Now, this shank, which we call the Gillette bayonet, was not designed to pierce, but to slice. The blade of a disposable razor is extracted from its plastic casing, and then attached to a pen or a pencil. Only, the danger with this sucker is… Ah! You end up cutting yourself._

“Yes. That’s good! Much more like it.”

Harold held up his hand, blood dripping steadily from his thumb onto the floor. “That’s because I cut the _shit_ out of my thumb, here. Can I get some first aid, please?” He looked down at the puddle of blood pooling on the platform, and frowned. It may not look like much, but it stung like a son of a bitch.

  


  


  


_This particular shank is called a blunt. It's fairly standard. A prisoner palms a hunk of metal working in the shop, and then rubs the metal against a stone wall - in Oz we got plenty of those - shaping it into a blade. The beauty of this baby is that it causes as much internal damage as possible._

“Good.” Buscemi smiled at him. “I think we’ve got enough of that one, Harold. Let’s move on.”

Harold got up and walked around while Adam - or whatever his name was - took the shank used in the last scene out of its hiding place in the armrest of Hill’s wheelchair. Adam tripped as he came down the stairs, the shank flying out of his hand and hitting Jim, one of the camera crew, in the middle of his back.

Harold saw it happen and expected blood, but fortunately, the shank hit handle first, and the weapon fell harmlessly to the floor. Jim turned around, surprised, as Alfonzo ran over, grabbing the shank off the floor and checking it for damage. “Sorry. I tripped,” he muttered, not even looking at the cameraman.

Jim shook his head as he watched the guy’s retreat. “Hey, no problem, Abe.”

Harold took one last gulp of water, then returned to the wheelchair. He plopped down in the seat, jumping up again at the sharp stab of pain in his ass.

“Fuck!” He reached behind him, grabbing for whatever it was that was deeply embedded in his left butt cheek. “What the hell?”

He heard Fontana call out: “ _Medic!_ Okay everybody; let’s take ten while we check out Harold’s ass.”

Harold blinked at the bloody toothbrush shank in his hand. “Man, this is not my day.”

 

* * *

  


"What kind of an idiot leaves a sharp weapon on the seat of a wheelchair?" Fontana was in rare form. Harold actually felt a fleeting moment of sympathy for Abner. "You are fired. I want you off this sound stage in five minutes. Is that understood, Alphonse?"

Archibald flinched, "Yes sir."

He stumbled away, followed closely by Marsha from props, who looked ready to strangle the man. Harold could understand that. Everything Anwar did reflected on the Properties Department as a whole, and as Props Master, she would have to deal with the fallout from this guy's ineptitude. Well, at least he wouldn’t be a problem anymore, thank god. Harold's sympathy had its limits, and getting shanked in the ass? Definitely a limit.

 

* * *

  


“Are you sure you’re okay?” Fontana asked for the fifth time in half an hour. “We can work around your scenes and pick you back up tomorrow. I don’t want to…”

“Tom, I’m fine.” Harold interrupted him, frustrated by all the crap he’d already dealt with today. “I just want to get this done and move on, all right?”

Fontana sighed. “Okay."

Buscemi clapped him on the shoulder. "Good, let’s do it then. You got your shank?”

“Oh, yeah, I got it.” Harold tried his best to control his limp as he walked up the two steps to the box, not wanting any more delays. “The nurse cleaned and disinfected it. It’s all ready to go.” He settled in the wheelchair a little more gingerly than normal, then shifted to the right, trying to find a better position. You’d think they would make wheelchairs more comfortable.

  


  


  


_This shank is a classic. The bottom end of a toothbrush is carved down to its sharpest point, almost like an arrowhead. But the best part is, the weapon doesn't have to be concealed. It can be placed in a pocket, bristles showing, ready to be grabbed for action._

Harold noticed that several crew members cringed when he pulled the shank out of his shirt pocket and aimed it at the camera, but he didn’t let it show. Some things were better left unsaid.

 

* * *

  


A different props assistant exchanged the toothbrush shank for the tightly coiled metal of the last one he had to handle today, thank god.

“Is Archie gone already?”

She frowned, puzzled. “Oh, you mean Agnew? Yeah, he's out of here.” She waved the toothbrush shank at him for emphasis. Harold managed to hide his flinch.

“Oh, sorry to hear that.” He wasn’t really, but it seemed like the polite thing to say.

She shrugged. “That’s okay. He was always kind of creepy, you know? And he never listened to the actors. He'd already been warned about arguing with them about where they placed their props.” She sounded as if the very idea was foreign to her, and Harold agreed.

He grinned. “Yeah, I kind of got that idea.”

She nodded at Harold sympathetically. “Now that he’s gone, you’ll be seeing more of me. And I promise you can arrange your props however you like.”

“Now that’s what I like to hear.’

“Nice to meet you, Mr. Perrineau.” She smiled at him brightly as she left the platform, calling back over her shoulder. “Oh, by the way, my name’s Nesha.”

“See you later, Nesha. Call me Harold, okay?”

That was more like it. It made his job a dozen times easier when he had a good relationship with the crew. While they set up the mattress springs for Hill’s next monologue, he examined the shank in his hand. This baby could do a lot of damage to someone’s insides. Once again, he realized just how lucky he was to be involved in a profession that had very little actual violence in it. It was true that there was a lot of simulated action, but that wasn’t the same as the real thing. That suited him fine; he was a lover, not a fighter.

  


  


  


_And then there's the Don Juan. You take a spring from the frame underneath your bed, uncoil it and then sharpen the edge. The wound itself is smaller, but goes much deeper. Like Don Juan, it penetrates._

“Cut! Yeah, that was great. Okay, let’s get all this stuff out of here, and we can shoot that last monologue and call it a day.” Buscemi crossed the room to speak to Ginger from Wardrobe. Harold couldn’t hear what they were saying, but it didn’t really matter, as long as the focus was off him for while.

He got up carefully, and limped over to the edge of the pod, leaning up against the wall, surreptitiously rubbing his ass cheek. It had been a long day. He was looking forward to going home and getting some sleep – on his stomach.

He breathed a sigh of relief as Nesha took the Don Juan shank from him. The last chance for any craziness today walked away with her, and he was glad to see it go. He closed his eyes and sighed with pleasure. Just one more monologue and it would all be over. He heard a sudden shout. A woman’s voice cried out, “No! Stop him!”

As Harold turned toward the sound, Amos ran across the sound stage, headed directly toward Fontana, with the Don Juan shank held firmly in his hand. He watched, shocked, as Fontana turned in the direction of the noise.

“What the hell do you want, Alonzo?” He looked annoyed; he obviously hadn’t seen the weapon yet.

Harold shouted, “He’s got a shank!” But it was too late.

“My name is Andrew! Do you hear me? Andrew!” he shouted, stabbing Fontana viciously, over and over again. By the time security pulled the guy off him, there was blood everywhere, and the medic was shouting for someone to call an ambulance as she held a bloody towel over the worst of Fontana’s wounds.

There was so much noise and confusion after that, people shouting and crying. The police were everywhere, followed closely by HBO’s Security team. This was going to be a real mess to clean up. Harold buried his head in his hands, rocking back and forth in Hill’s chair. He just couldn’t believe it.

Tom Fontana was dead. Life in Oz would never be the same.

 

* * *

  


Augustus Hill sat up with a start, gazing around him in shock. The familiar walls of Em City’s pods looked suddenly foreign and bizarre. He took several deep breaths, his racing heart calming slowly as he listened to the nasal wheeze of Burr’s snore from the bunk above his. He flopped back onto his mattress, disappointed beyond belief. It was all a dream. His life as an actor, the cameras and crew, that nut case Tom Fontana, and the creepy props guy, Antoine. All of it had been a fucking dream.

The buzzer was annoyingly loud this morning as the lights snapped on, announcing the beginning of another day. Augustus sighed. When you lived in Oz, life went on, but nothing ever changed.

  


  


  


The monotony of working in the dress factory was mind numbing: grab a bolt and pull, cut here, back and repeat, and repeat, and repeat. It was difficult for Augustus to keep his mind on his task. He’d been thinking about his dream all morning, he’d never had this much trouble getting a dream out of his head. The last thing he needed to do was to lose his concentration and get shanked. Working with Redding had put him back in the middle of a dangerous crowd. He couldn’t afford to be distracted by something stupid like a dream.

“Augustus!”

He barely heard his name over the noise of the factory machinery. Turning his chair around, he saw Rebadow approaching, towing someone behind him.

“I’m showing the new guy around. I thought I’d introduce you.”

When he stepped out from behind Rebadow, Augustus felt the blood in his veins turn to ice, and his heart clenched painfully. It was him - the props assistant from hell. Augustus' voice shook as he spoke.

“A-Alvin?”

The man’s eyes narrowed and he sneered as he took in Augustus’ wheelchair. “The name’s Andrew, crip.” He turned and walked away.

“Well, that wasn’t nice!” Rebadow followed Andrew, mumbling to himself, or god, or somebody.

Augustus shivered as a chill ran down his spine. Dream or ghost – it didn’t matter. He was sleeping with a shank under his pillow tonight.

  
The End


End file.
